The clash was unlike anything Matthew had ever experienced.
When he fought the Sentinels or the Arbiters, there was a sense of impact—the sound of breaking metal, the heat of the energy, the resistance of a shield. But as he lunged at Jaden, swinging a heavy blade of violet Void-energy, there was only Silence.
Matthew's violet blade met Jaden's black sword. There was no clang of steel. Instead, the point where the two energies met became a "Zero-Point." The light in the room was sucked into the collision, creating a sphere of pitch-black darkness that expanded and contracted in a fraction of a second.
Matthew felt the feedback instantly. It wasn't pain; it was a terrifying numbness. It felt as though his very thoughts were being pulled out of his head.
"Calculation error," Jaden whispered, his face inches from Matthew's. "You are pushing. You are trying to exert force. You cannot exert force on the Void. You can only define its boundaries."
With a flick of his wrist, Jaden bypassed Matthew's guard. He didn't cut Matthew's arm; he tapped the air an inch away from Matthew's elbow.
Matthew felt a sudden, jarring sensation of missing something. He looked down and gasped. A perfect, circular chunk of his sleeve—and a shallow layer of his skin—was simply gone. No blood. No pain. Just a smooth, cauterized crater of non-existence.
"Matthew!" Lyra screamed, sliding off his back as he stumbled. She hit the wet floor, her hands glowing with her faint, flickering mana. "Stop it! Both of you!"
"Stay back, Lyra!" Matthew shouted, his breath coming in ragged gasps. He clutched his arm, the violet aura around him flickering wildly. The Void Core was screaming now, sensing a predator that didn't just want to fight, but wanted to replace it.
"Jaden, that's enough!" Alyssa moved, her red cloak fluttering like a banner of blood in the dim light. she stepped between the two boys, her hand outstretched toward Jaden. "The Crimson Tether is spiking. Your heart rate is climbing too fast. If you keep this up, the Void will start eating your memory-banks again."
Jaden paused, his black blade hovering in the air. He looked at Alyssa, and for a fleeting second, the mechanical stillness in his eyes flickered. A trace of a human emotion—annoyance? Concern?—passed through his expression before being buried under the ice of his Null-Calculation.
"He is a danger to the stability of this reality, Alyssa," Jaden said, though he lowered his blade. "His 'Void' is a primitive version of the True Null. It is a cancer that will consume him and everyone around him."
"And you were a danger to Aethelgard once, remember?" Alyssa retorted, her eyes flashing with a fierce protectiveness. She turned to look at Matthew, then at the shivering Lyra and the unconscious Seraphina. "They're kids, Jaden. They're running from the same kind of 'Architects' we are. Look at them. They aren't an 'equation.' They're people."
Matthew stood up slowly, his violet eyes glowing with a defiant, wounded light. "I don't know what you're talking about—multiverses, equations, memory-banks. All I know is that the people who built this place are coming to kill us. If you aren't one of them, then get out of our way."
Jaden sheathed his blade with a soundless click. He looked around the Drowned Levels, his eyes scanning the massive pipes and the distant, glowing ceiling of the Spire's foundation.
"The structural integrity of this 'Spire' is based on a Tier 2 Law of Gravity," Jaden remarked, as if he were reading a weather report. "It is inefficient. It will fall eventually, even without your interference."
He looked back at Matthew. "You have a sister, don't you? A blood-resonance I can detect in your DNA-trace?"
Matthew froze. "How do you know that?"
"I don't 'know' it. I calculate it," Jaden replied. "And if you continue to use your power in this manner, you will be the reason she dies. Not the Architects. Not the Gods. You."
Matthew felt as if he had been punched in the gut. The image of the Older Matthew—with his shattered eyes and his warning about the "Void Eclipse"—flashed through his mind.
"I'm going to protect them," Matthew said, his voice trembling with a mixture of rage and fear. "I made a vow."
"A vow is a variable that is often discarded when the equation becomes too complex," Jaden said coldly.
"Shut up, Jaden," Alyssa sighed, stepping toward Lyra. She knelt down, offering a hand to help the girl up. "Don't mind him. He's... he's forgotten how to talk to people. He thinks everything is a math problem."
Lyra looked at Alyssa's hand, then at Matthew. She took the hand, her fingers trembling against Alyssa's warm skin. "Who are you? Truly?"
Alyssa smiled, a sad, weary expression. "We're just two ghosts trying to find our way home. And it looks like our path just crashed into yours."
A sudden, earth-shaking boom echoed from the ceiling. Dust and debris rained down from the pipes. The green moss flickered and died as a massive golden light began to burn through the metal plates a hundred feet above them.
"The High Architect," Matthew whispered, his face turning pale. "He found us."
Jaden looked up at the ceiling, his eyes reflecting the descending golden fire. "A Tier 9 Divine Entity. Highly inefficient. Jaden, pull the Null-Barrier. We have 60 seconds before this sector is purged."